Which term describes the process of joining the final consonant of one word to the initial vowel of the next word with no pause?

• A. Catenation
• B. Affixation
• C. Assimilation
• D. Elision

Answer: (A)

Connecting sounds across word boundaries in fluent speech is called catenation. When the final consonant of one word is carried over into the next word that starts with a vowel, and you speak with no pause, the sounds join into one smooth sequence. For example, saying “red apple” quickly can sound like “redapple,” with the final /d/ blending into the following vowel. This is about linking across words to keep the flow, not about adding prefixes or suffixes (affixation), changing one sound to resemble another (assimilation), or dropping a sound (elision).